Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius eBook

stood forward and said, that in his opinion they ought
to decline no course whereby their country might be
saved; and that as the very existence of Rome depended
on the preservation of her army, that army must be
saved at any sacrifice, for whether the means be honourable
or ignominious, all is well done that is done for
the defence of our country. And he said that
were her army preserved, Rome, in course of time, might
wipe out the disgrace; but if her army were destroyed,
however gloriously it might perish, Rome and her freedom
would perish with it. In the event his counsel
was followed.

Now this incident deserves to be noted and pondered
over by every citizen who is called on to advise his
country; for when the entire safety of our country
is at stake, no consideration of what is just or unjust,
merciful or cruel, praiseworthy or shameful, must intervene.
On the contrary, every other consideration being set
aside, that course alone must be taken which preserves
the existence of the country and maintains its liberty.
And this course we find followed by the people of
France, both in their words and in their actions, with
the view of supporting the dignity of their king and
the integrity of their kingdom; for there is no remark
they listen to with more impatience than that this
or the other course is disgraceful to the king.
For their king, they say, can incur no disgrace by
any resolve he may take, whether it turn out well
or ill; and whether it succeed or fail, all maintain
that he has acted as a king should.

CHAPTER XLII.—­That Promises made on Compulsion are not to be
observed.

When, after being subjected to this disgrace, the
consuls returned to Rome with their disarmed legions,
Spurius Posthumius, himself one of the consuls, was
the first to contend in the senate that the terms made
in the Caudine Valley were not to be observed.
For he argued that the Roman people were not bound
by them, though he himself doubtless was, together
with all the others who had promised peace; wherefore,
if the people desired to set themselves free from
every engagement, he and all the rest who had given
this promise must be made over as prisoners into the
hands of the Samnites. And so steadfastly did
he hold to this opinion, that the senate were content
to adopt it, and sending him and the rest as prisoners
back to Samnium, protested to the Samnites that the
peace was not binding. And so kind was Fortune
to Posthumius on this occasion, that the Samnites
would not keep him as a prisoner, and that on his
return to Rome, notwithstanding his defeat, he was
held in higher honour by the Romans than the victorious
Pontius by his countrymen.